castrate
/kæsˈtɹeɪt/
"castrate" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“castrate” is uncommon English (frequency #64,250 among 5,599 “C” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #64,250
- frequency rank, English
- 5,599
- “C” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A castrated man; a eunuch.
Corpus desk
Index EN-castrate · castrate · English
castrate · rank #64,250 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #64,250
- LEN-LONG 8 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 5,599
- PHOTO-FINISH catheterizati…
Nearest frequency peer: catheterization (+1 rank slots)
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
Long-tail ranks near “castrate”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- capsize
capsize
35,755 corpus weight
- Carnes
Carnes
35,754 corpus weight
- cassation
cassation
35,753 corpus weight
- castrate
castrate
35,751 corpus weight
- catheteriza…
catheterization
35,750 corpus weight
- CCU
CCU
35,747 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “castrate” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | castrate |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /kæsˈtɹeɪt/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #64,250 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “castrate” in English
Rare enough to double-check
castrate is uncommon English at frequency #64,250 among 5,599 “C” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed /kæsˈtɹeɪt/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "A castrated man; a eunuch.".
Zero misspellings are on record for castrate in our index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. Our dataset records no confusable match here, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: Likely from an unattested sense of Middle English castrat (“(adjective) castrated; (noun) a castrated animal”), substantivized borrowing of Latin castrātus, perfect passive participle of castrō (“to prune, amputate, castrate”), see -ate (noun-forming suffix)). The correct English form is castrate, spelled C-A-S-T-R-A-T-E.
Definition
- 1A castrated man; a eunuch.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how castrate appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
The castrate voice had a strange power not duplicated by soprano or countertenor.
Etymology
Likely from an unattested sense of Middle English castrat (“(adjective) castrated; (noun) a castrated animal”), substantivized borrowing of Latin castrātus, perfect passive participle of castrō (“to prune, amputate, castrate”), see -ate (noun-forming suffix)).
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "castrate", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 8 letters (nearest by frequency rank).